Translation:The High Mountains/11

Our friends sleep soundly in their huts. From time to time one of them talks in his sleep.

Some cry out, “Tomorrow we leave for the mountains!” and then go back to sleep again.

One says: “It's not time to go to school, I tell you. The bell hasn't rung!”

Another: “Mummy, I don't want such a little slice of bread!”

A third: “Watch out for my mother! I took all the sweets in the cupboard.”

This was Foudoulis. When he woke up and saw he had nothing, he was cross. He didn't want to go back to sleep for fear of it starting again. But fatigue sent him back to sleep.

Phanis opened his eyes. Through some holes in his hut he sees the sky and understands that it is still night.

But he cannot get back to sleep. He gets dressed and slips out of the hut; he wants to see the night in the forest. He sits down outside on the ground.

It's the first time he's seen a sky so deep. All these stars! It's like a great swarm dispersed in the sky to gather pollen. So many stars up here, fewer lower down. Over there two stars together. Over there one by itself, as if forgotten. Five, six stars together that form a little branch. Maybe that's the Pleiades?

Right above Phanis, in the middle of the sky, a little white river runs calmly from north to south; this sheds a myriad of tiny white stars, like flowers.

In the forest innumerable crickets sing the same chorus.

On their stones or from their holes in the gound these small singers saw the glow of the stars and stridulated. And afterwards one could hear from afar the bells of the herd. They are the Vlachs. The large herd which is grazing must be theirs . Listen to all those bells! ….Little, big, high, low, sweet, harsh. Constant ringing, like the stars, like the crickets.

And suddenly a green star lights up. As if it were very happy, it spun around among the others and disappeared.....

What a beautiful night!

Phanis began to feel cold, he went inside to lie down. But even in the shelter he saw the stars shining.

To him all the stars seemed to be his. Nobody else had seen them.

He fell asleep listening to the bells.